editorial - slot techslot-tech.com/members/magazine/lores/january08.pdfslot tech editorial randy...

Editorial

Page 6Quick & Simple Repairs #34

Page 17Nanoptix Inverted Printer

Page 18Slot-Tickets

Page 24Introduction to Slot Technology

Course Offered at CSN

Page 26Slot Tech Show Report

SlotFest 2007

Page 29Ceronix LCD Monitor

Power Supply Replacement

8Subscriptions and Order Form

January 2008

Inside Slot Tech Magazine

Peace

January 2008Slot Tech Magazine

Slot Tech Editorial

Randy Fromm's

Slot Tech Magazine

EditorRandy Fromm

Technical WritersTed Befus, Jason Czito,

Kevin Noble, Herschel W.Peeler, Pat Porath, Vic

Fortenbach

International ContributorMartin Dempsey

Slot Tech Magazine is publishedmonthly bySlot Tech Magazine1944 Falmouth Dr.El Cajon, CA 92020-2827tel.619.593.6131 fax.619.593.6132e-mail [email protected] the website at slot-techs.com

SUBSCRIPTIONSDomestic (USA) 1 year - $60.00 2 years - $120.00International 1 year - $120.00 2 years -$240.00

Copyright 2007 under the UniversalCopyright Convention. All rights re-served.

Slot Tech Editorial

Randy Fromm

Happy new year! Ihope everyone had anice holiday season

and that you are all feelingrenewed and recharged forthe fabulous new yearahead. I am most pleased toannounce that Slot TechMagazine’s new year beginswith a bang. In fact, it’s asort of “shot heard ‘roundthe world” as it is my plea-sure to announce a new,international edition called,appropriately, Slot TechInternational Magazine. Theactual debut will be at theICE show in London later

this month. Slot Tech Inter-national will follow thesame format as the maga-zine you’re reading now butwill feature the productsand services found outsideof North America with con-tributors from Europe andDown Under. The newmagazine will have its head-quarters in London, En-gland. David Corfield will bethe European Editor. Youcan reach him [email protected]. Forthe international edition, Ihave taken the role of Tech-nical Editor.

If you are outside theUnited States and Canadaand you’re interested in asubscription to the newmagazine, drop me an e-mail and I’ll sign you up fora trial subscription. If youlike it, you can covert to thenew edition or get themboth!

This month Pat Porath hasbeen busy at his casino butnot so busy that he hasn’ttaken the time to share hisexperiences with us. Quick& Simple Repairs #34 leadsoff on page six. I think thisis one of the best ones yet.

Now that Ticket-In Ticket-out has been around longenough to have some his-tory, it’s time to take a lookback at the origins of this

revolutionary (maybe evolu-tionary) development with aclose look at the Slot Tick-ets themselves. Slot-Tick-ets. Page 18.

How often have you beenasked the question: “Wherecan I learn to become a slottech?” Open this magazineto page 24, slap it on thecopy machine and handhim or her a copy of theSlot Tech Feature Articleentitled “Introduction toSlot Technology CourseOffered at CSN.”

There’s some coverage ofSlotFest as well as a de-tailed pictorial of LCDpower supply replacementinside as well. Enjoy.

That’s all for this month.See you at the casino.

Slot Tech MagazineJanuary 2008

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Slot Tech Feature Article

IGT Reel #3 Problem

A call was received tolook at the reel on anS2000. At first it

appeared to be a voltageproblem. When the mainslot door was closed andthe reels would try to re-spin to the last game, the#3 reel wouldn't spin prop-erly. It would rotate incon-sistently. I gave the reel aspin manually and did thesame with reel #2 (simplygive the reel a spin withyour fingers). A difference inresistance was felt betweenthe two. The third reeldidn't seem to have asmuch voltage on it to hold itin place when compared tothe second reel. The pinswere checked behind it tomake sure none had beenpushed out of place or bent.They all looked good. Themain processor board wasremoved to see if anythingwas loose or out of placebut that looked good too.Maybe there is a poor con-nection at themotherboard? All of theconnections were checkedon the motherboard butthey looked good as well.

Quick & Simple Repairs # 34

Next, the reel was pulledout again to inspect it a bitcloser. The optic and theoptic encoder looked finetoo. They were free ofcracks and obstructions. Ineeded a second opinion onthis one, so a co-workerchecked it out. He decidedto swap the main processorboards and the problemfollowed the board. A sparewas later installed and thegame works awesome.Pretty weird though, a badmain board would cause areel problem. Not a fakeproblem either, a REELproblem! Of course, a quickglance at the schematicdiagram for the main boardreveals the driver circuitryfor reel #3 but this column

is reserved for the Quickand Simple things that areperformed on the slot floorand that doesn’t includecomponent level PCB re-pair.

I've seen strange thingsbefore though, such as aquarter sitting JUST RIGHTon a diverter solenoid thatwould not allow a game topower up properly. Powersupplies were changed,wiring and fuses checked,and all along it was thequarter causing problems.Not shorting out badenough to blow a fuse or“let the smoke out” butenough to cause the gameto malfunction. Once thequarter was removed, thegame was fine.

By Pat Porath


The "Not so Simple" CDSCOM Repair

Wow, was this an ordeal todiagnose! The trouble: poorCDS COM in select gamesin a bank of machines. Thecure: a loose connection ona Molex 3 pin plug that is inthe drop area of the games.

How did we detect thatthere was a problem? Therewere two tickets that thecashier cage called about

that scanned as "do notexist." As we know, the slotmachine printed it and ithad the "watermark" on itso the ticket does indeedexist. With the use of "diag-nostic monitor" and a fewclicks of the mouse, I couldsee that a select few gameswere not communicatingwith the system. Was theproblem on the game side,the system side, or theSentinel side? Could it be"COM chips," one bad "Sen-

tinel" taking down a fewmachines, or a wiring is-sue? At this point weweren't sure.

Let the troubleshootingbegin! I could see that nodoubt there was an issuewith a specific bank ofgames. One bank of ma-chines only included fourgames but the other in-cluded 12, which totals 16.With all of the equipment,games, and wiring, whatcould be the problem? Westarted out by looking atthe bank of four games thatappeared to be the worst.The letters on the CDSdisplay were flashing fromupper case text to lowercase which usually indi-cates a poor COM problemwithin the bank.

I removed a Sentinel from agame that didn't have anyCOM at all, thinking itmight be the problem. Withthe replacement installed,there wasn't much of achange. The green LED onthe Sentinel board is sup-posed to flash rapidly toshow communication isgood. In this case, the greenLED flashed very slowlymeaning that it had poorcommunication.

How about changing an-other Sentinel in a game inthe bank that is showingpoor communication andwhy not toss in some newCOM chips in Sentinels inthe bank? This was com-pleted without positiveresults. Hmmm. Getting abit tricky now. The problem


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must be somewhere in thebank of 12 games. With theuse of a "tech card" aka"mechanic card" a slot techcan see all kinds of items.For example: COM errors,the current Data Port thatthe machine is connectedto, the current time anddate, among many otherthings. In this case wewanted to observe the COMerrors. One game in thebank showed 80 errors, yetanother game would show170 COM errors.

One way to troubleshoot iswith a "terminator." A ter-minator is a small, two-pinconnector that is commonlyfound on the SMI boardwhich is located right nextto the Sentinel board. Thered (don't know why, butalways red) two pin connec-tor can't be classified as aterminator yet though. Itneeds one small commonitem found in most slot techshops, a 100 ohm resistor.There have been timeswhere techs have workedon banks of machines

where a terminator did notexist. In the system that weare running, a terminator MU S T be in place at the endgame at the end of the lineof the loop. Another way toput it, if you have a total of20 games on a DPU (not toexceed 24) the last game inthe last bank, Sentinelidentification number 20,must have a terminator onthe "COM OUT" section ofthe Sentinel. If a terminatoris NOT in place, we haveexperienced COM problemsthroughout a bank. It canbe difficult to narrow downthe problem. In some caseswe will identify the lastgame that is located in abank and make sure it hasone on it. In the long run,this saves time.

Another use for the termi-nator is for troubleshootingreasons. How? Well, since ithas to be at the END of thebank of games, a tech canput it in the middle of thebank. Once this is in placeand the COM problem goesaway, the main problem

must be in the last half thatisn't currently connected toa DPU. If the COM problemstill exists once the bank issplit in half (with the use ofa terminator) then the prob-lem must be in the firsthalf. One may split thebank in half again (1/4 ofthe original) and install theterminator. Once again, ifthe problem goes away thenthe problem looks like it willbe in the second half whichisn't connected. If the prob-lem stays, more than likelythere is a problem withinthe first 1/4th of games.Another perspective: I liketo think that electricity andCDS data flow like waterthough a pipe so if you"shut the data valve off" tohalf of the bank of gamesand the problem goes away,the problem is in the sec-ond half. If the problemstays, it is somewhere inthe location of the first half.Shut the valve off to moregames to narrow down theproblem. If it is down tofour games within a bank,start checking out every-

Terminator


thing such as the CDSwiring under the gamesthat are "looped" from oneto the other. Replace COMchips, and Sentinels ifnecessary. Sometimes (itseems) COM chip replace-ment will do the trick.Other times, a bad Sentinelwill "take down" the com-munication of games too. Isa data line a bit exposedand may have happened toget unplugged?

Narrowing down whichgame or games in a bank isthe hard part. Anotheruseful tool to use is a CDS"jumper cable." This item ismade up of two of the redtwo-pin connectors (one oneach end) and a two-con-ductor cable between them.We always have some ofthese on hand. You caneasily make a long jumpercable by using the itemsmentioned above or, if youonly need to make a con-nection within a few games,a "COM IN" or "COM OUT"cable off of a spare Sentinelassembly may be used.However, if you borrow acable off of a good spareSentinel BE SURE to put itback on when you are com-pleted with it. We haveseveral of all three kinds instock and ready to use. Infact we have a large shelfassembly with storage binsall marked with spare CDSitems that include some ofthe following: COM INcables, COM OUT cables,Sentinels, SMI boards, IGTinterface cables, WMS inter-face cables, Bally, CDSpower supplies, and many

other items. The point be-ing, if you don't have spareCOM IN, COM OUT cablesand a terminator, youshould! It will help you outa lot in troubleshooting theCDS/Oasis system.Alright? Back to our regu-larly scheduled program(LOL). With the use of aterminator, some COMchips, two spare Sentinels,a spare COM out cable,duct tape (Naw! Just kid-ding) and a "tech card, “theproblem was FINALLY lo-cated between two ma-chines. It came down toseeing how the replacementparts worked in the games.If two machines stillwouldn't communicate (evenwith replacement Sentinels)and they worked error freewith a jumper cable inplace, the problem pointstoward the cables that arerun between the games. Youknow, the ones that runfrom the Sentinel throughthe game, through the slotbase to the game next to it,

and so on. This specificcase involved a bad connec-tion that is located in theslot base area. Some way,some how, the Molex con-nector was loose and hadcreated the numerous COMerrors on the CDS displaysof the games themselves. Italso showed up as "wasactive" on the diagnosticmonitor. If you have accessto looking at the "Pollers"(the computers that pro-cess and poll the slot infor-mation) the games willdisplay an unusual color.Ours is setup to showYELLOW as a normal,active, "online" game. BLUE= bad. This color means thegame and or Sentinel lostcommunication.

I'm sorry but I'm not per-mitted to take any photo-graphs of our Poller screensor our diagnostic monitorscreens. As an example of atypical diagnostic report,we have reprinted JasonCzito’s "Poller 3" photo-


graph from page 26 in theSeptember 2007 issue ofSlot Tech Magazine so youcan get an idea what onelooks like. This is a totallyfake report. I usedPhotoshop to add somecolored squares.

Notice the yellow squares?They indicate that thesegames are "normal". Bluewould mean a game is in a"was active" (was online)state. Black = "offline"meaning the game is totallyoffline and may have beenremoved from the system,in which case a game hasbeen taken off of the floorand put in the warehouse.

In conclusion, the problemwas a poor Molex connec-tion which is located in theslot base. With the connec-tion and the total of 6 pinsall snug and in place, theCOM errors depleted.

Replacement of Worn CDSKeypads

While thinking of some"busywork" that would passthe day away, I thought“why not replace some ofthe worn CDS keypads thatare on the floor?” On someof them, the "enter" buttonis completely worn off.There were plenty on handand in stock, so why not? Ihad selected a bank inwhich many of them wereworn out when I started tonotice something. Not onlywere the keypads worn,there were other problemstoo. On this bank of games,there were some loose CDS

displays. In one case, a bolthad come out of a bracket.On a few other games, thecard reader was starting tocome loose. More thanlikely this would have beencaused by vibrations suchas customers using thehandle of the game. Aftermonths and months ofvibration, something isbound to loosen up. Even acouple of the main doorlocks were a bit loose.

The plan was to replaceworn keypads, even thoughit turned out (in a fewcases) to be “preventivemaintenance” which is agood thing. Why not take anextra minute to quickly

inspect a game? If you arein it to replace a part and acustomer isn't waiting toplay it, take the time tocheck it out. If I hadn'ttightened the card readersand displays, a tech wouldhave been called to it lateranyway, probably on a"concert weekend" whichmeans (at our casino) 1,325people are in to watch ashow. Also, when a game isbooting up and it takes afew minutes, this can allowfor a quick inspection of agame too (if time allows).Does the game have goodcommunication with thetracking system? Are thelocks tight? Etc., etc.


An Ithaca 750 and Drink-ing Don't Mix

I received a call on thisgame, a very popular olderslant top WMS game. Adrink had spilled on thegame. The cup had to bealmost full of Coke, rootbeer, or whatever it wasbecause there was a lot ofliquid all over. The slotattendant said he couldsmell "something burning"and when I opened up theprinter door area, no doubtthe liquid was shorting outa printer board which islocated just to the right ofthe printer head.

Right away, the 120 VACpower cable was discon-nected and the game wasshut off. The security po-dium was nearby so I bor-rowed some paper towelsfrom them to soak up themess. Spare parts weren't a

problem for the game. Wehave two or three printheads for it as well as acouple of the interfaceboards, power supplies andsuch. I tried a replacementprinter head in it a halfhour later but the interfaceboard was definitelycooked. I thought it wasbest not to work on it any-more on my shift in order tolet it completely dry out.Later, a different shift re-placed the interface boardand the game was good togo. Luckily nothing tooserious shorted out. With alittle "drying time" and acouple of replacementparts, the game was backonline.

Aristocrat Power Problem

We had an Aristocrat up-right game with a powerproblem. The game wasshut down, the main pro-

reinstalled. When the powerwas reapplied to the gamebut it was dead. It didn'thave the infamous Aristo-crat "door alarm," no highvoltage on the monitor, andthe bill acceptor didn't evenmake a noise. Since themain processor had justbeen reseated, I thought Ihad best check to makesure that it had been seatedproperly. As most of usknow, if the main boardisn't seated the game will bedead. I made sure that boththe main and the I.O.boards were in place andtried another power cycle.Nothing changed, still abso-lutely no response from thegame.

The symptoms appeared topoint to a power issue sothe main power connectionswere checked; they alllooked good. Why not try a"hard boot" on the game?


Even though many times Iwould like to give a game anactual "hard boot in theeye" in this case a hardboot is when the mainpower plug is disconnectedfrom the power supply andthe game does not have any120 VAC supplied to it atall. On some types of up-right Aristocrat games(Mark IV?) there are twopower cables going into twopower supplies. The uppercable, once disconnected,will shut down the auxiliaryoutlet for the game. Thelower power cable (locatedin the lower right hand sideof the game behind the billacceptor assembly) is themain. Simply unplug themain power cable and thiswill result in what I call agame "hard boot." It onlyworks some of the time andI don't have a scientifictechnical explanation butthe main point is thatsometimes it works! In thisspecific case of a more orless "dead" game, a hard

boot brought it back to life.I simply unplugged themain power cable for 20seconds and plugged itback in. When the mainpower switch was turned onit was alive. "It's alive! It'salive!” The game came upperfectly and I haven'theard a peep out of it since.Now for the tricky part, whydid the game react the wayit did? My only conclusionis that the main powersupply may be getting weakOR something in the soft-ware was slightly corrupt.Main objective: (in my per-sonal opinion) the game isup, running well, andonline.

Bally "Hot Shot" Progres-sive Symbol Issue

If a "Bally Alpha Hot Shot"progressive game is setupfor "Legacy Bonusing" theremay be an issue in which asymbol improperly remainson the screen through thenext game. As an example

which may occur, a "Bar"symbol lands on a line andit stays on the line through-out the following spin of themachine. All of the payoutsare correct, which are in-cluded the last game recall.If the situation does occurwith the symbol remaining,it may cause confusion to acustomer. This specificordeal may only happen ifthe machine is setup for"Legacy Bonusing."

The part numbers andspecific games affected areas follows. All are "Hot ShotProgressive" "All AboutMoney" part number20321A and part number20321B "Winning Times"part number 20330A "Blaz-ing 7's" part number20392A Contact your BallyTechnologies for a replace-ment "Personality Program"if need be.

WMS Goldfish Fish ButtonProblem

The error on the game was"single row universal ani-mator command timeout.”What in the world was this?Single row universal what?"Command timeout" Some-what sounds like a softwareissue. Maybe. A fellow techhad swapped out both ofthe CF cards and therewasn't a change in the errorat all. Next, the main pro-cessor was changed out.There wasn't a change thereeither. If the problem wasn'tin the main board and notin the CF cards, wherecould the problem be? I had


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to call our WMS tech for theanswer. If anyone hasheard of it, he would have.The call was placed and hehad the answer right away.He said that it is a "FishButton" problem! Ok, I wastotally lost here (onceagain). What could the FishButton have to do with a"single row universal ani-mator command timeout"error?

First of all the Fish Buttonis the oval illuminatedbutton on the game thatconnects with a small boardin the main door (on anupright game). Next, thereis a CAT-5 cable that con-nects between the smallboard and another boardthat is located in the upperleft hand side of the game.This board has multipleCAT-5 cables connected toit. The WMS tech said whenthis error occurs, it is usu-ally a bad button board or abad cable. In this case, thecable was replaced from thesmall board to the upperleft board and the unusualerror cleared right away.When the cable was in-spected closely, you couldsee that the green wireinside the connector hadn'tbeen seated properly whenit was crimped. I suppose itwas making just enough ofa connection to work for awhile, then all of the sud-den it didn't.

- Pat Porath- [email protected]

Slot Tech Press Release



Thermal imaging, fan-folded paper ticketsare now the backbone

of many coinless slot sys-tems such as IGT’s EZ-Pay ,Aristocrat’s OSAIS andBally’s SMS. It may come asa surprise but these ticketsas they are known todayand their manufacturingtechnology did not existwhen printer manufacturerFutureLogic first knockedon the door of thermalprinting expert TomMitchell, inquiring how tomake the slips of paper thatwould eventually replacecoins and tokens in almostall slots worldwide. Mitchellformed a company andcalled it Slot-Tickets. This isthe company that developedthe world standard for theubiquitous folded packs oftickets and this is the storyof the slot machine’s switchfrom metal to paper.

In the Beginning

Three United States patentslater and several billions oftickets sold, it looks simplebut that was far from thecase back on March 15,2000 when the first tickets

for the Fiesta Casino in LasVegas sprang to life on theslot floor. The ticket had tobe produced to almostimpossible standards inorder to outperform existingcoin handling devices,perfected over the pastcentury. No jams, no tiltsand above all very lowmaintenance by floor per-sonnel. Anyone can make afew hundred or a thousandtickets but making billions,all custom printed and withzero defects, was a hugechallenge.

The special part was thefan-folded packs. These

special packs had to beburst—torn apart at theperforation—without jam-ming in the slot machines.The tolerances were incred-ibly tight and the perfora-tion so fragile that produc-tion at first seemed impos-sible. There is no papercutter in the slot printer soit is only this fragile perfo-ration that keeps thewheels of every slot ma-chine running smoothly,unnoticed, by the millionsof players and thousands ofslot operators everyday,worldwide.

Eric Meyerhofer Tom Mitchell


PERFORMANCE YOU CAN DEPEND ON:• Zero defects: no jamming, no downtime

• Easy-lift, banded packs simplify unpacking & loading

• Multiple plants for expeditious production & delivery

• Inventory management services

• Exceptional, one-to-one customer service

Approved for use by all TITO peripheralequipment OEMs and slot machinemanufacturers worldwide

For exceptional service,contact Susan Mitchell

[email protected]

www.slot-tickets.com

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It Was a Good Inventionand They Did It

How did all this comeabout? The beginning ofSlot-Tickets was marked bya phone call in the late fallof 1998 from EricMeyerhofer, today’s Presi-dent of FutureLogic, Inc.inquiring if Mitchell couldmake thermal paper stockin US dollar bill size thatcould be fan-folded. Theconcept of using use ther-mal tickets in place of coinsand tokens in slots hadbeen initiated by IGT.Mitchell became interestedwhen Meyerhofer said theyneeded a few million ofthese a year. Needless tosay, they were both sur-prised when the numberturned out to be one thou-sand times larger.

Meyerhofer knew thatMitchell had spent manyyears developing uniquethermal media products forFedEx and explained thathis printer requirement wasto have no paper cutter andno serrated cutting edges.In fact, the paper literallyhad to “pop out” with noeffort. Mitchell couldn’tresist the challenge.

“I knew thermal papertechnology and grabbed mytrusty Kanzaki Paper Speci-fication book and looked fora paper that was highspeed, because Eric saidthis thing had to be fast, “said Mitchell. “ I decided ithad to feel like UnitedStates currency. Right thereon page 19, Kanzaki TO-

381N appeared to fit thebill. Today it accounts formost of the billions of tick-ets produced worldwide.”

It looked like they were setto go but Mitchell’s enthusi-asm was soon cooled whenhe went to his convertingpartners at the printingfacility in Algoma, Wiscon-sin. They put the test roll,kindly provided by Kanzaki,up on the press and theirfirst attempt to make thisridiculously fragile perfora-tion failed. So did severalmore as they learned toperfect the art, which iswhat it turned out to be.

FutureLogic had providedthem with an early betaprinter version using theSeiko print engine so theycould test their perforationbursting characteristics.Everything they made wasso tight (a printing term forstrong) that at first theycould pull the entire stackof tickets out of the printer

without any of the perfora-tions “bursting” the termused for breaking a singleticket.

”Converting” is an industryterm that describes taking alarge roll of paper andprinting ink onto the sur-face. The presses—theyhave a couple hundred—areknown as narrow webpresses. Huge paper “logs”from Kanzaki are slit intosmaller press master rollsonto which the casino logosare printed as well as theTop of Form registrationmarks and anti-counterfeitmeasures. At the end of thepress, engraved die cuttingdrums fold the ticketstream at the perforationsand Bingo! You have packsof tickets. Sounds easy,right? No!

Those huge presses run athundreds of feet per minuteand many streams wide.After all, they have to makemillions of these a year at


low cost. The problem wasthat speed and fragile perfo-rations don’t mix. It tookseveral months to fine tune,invent and get control ofthis beast so they couldfinally make what were tobecome the first tickets forthe Fiesta in Las Vegas.

IGT’s EZ Pay concept wasfirst shown in Las Vegas inSeptember 1999 at theWorld Gaming Conferenceand Expo. By December of1999, EZ-Pay was beinginstalled at the Fiesta andgaming history was made.Arguably, the introductionof TITO ranks right up therewith the incorporation ofvideo displays and billacceptors as one of themost notable modern devel-opments of the industry.

Today, Slot-Tickets pro-duces tickets in two WSPackaging Group, Inc.facilities: One in Algoma,Wisconsin and the other inPhoenix, Arizona. They areproduced at extremely highspeed and the Slot-Ticketsgroup is proud to hold theSigma Six best record forthe highest quality productout of 15 WSPG facilities.Their ten billionth ticketwill soon come off thepresses.

Their sales and marketingstrategy, facilitated by Su-san Mitchell, President ofSlot-Tickets, is focusedprimarily on direct sales inthe US and through severaldistributors worldwide. InEurope, the Mediterraneanand North Africa they are


represented by Eurocoin, inAsia they have Cointech, inAustralia Methodical Ser-vices, SEAC does SouthAmerica, John Fucile theCaribbean, as well as Suzo-Happ.

Editor’s Note: In a technicalpublication like Slot TechMagazine, we would beremiss if we did not coverthe basics of thermal imag-ing paper technology. Theyin the trade call this “directthermal” paper.

The Paper Maker:The base substrate is veryimportant because it is thebackbone of the product.Normally they do notspecify the paper mill to beused. That is left to theCoater but the importanceof a flat, white smooth sheetis critical to the end result.They want the ticket toprint, with ink, the logosand anything else the ca-sino management may wantwith good color rendition,exceptional smudge resis-tance, and strength.

The Coater:Kanzaki Specialty Paperssupplies the vast majorityof the ticket stock. Appletonand Nashua are also certi-fied thermal coaters. Whatthese companies do is applythe thermal chemistry onhuge rolls of paper thatcomes from the paper mill.The equipment is massive;the rolls are up to 2.7meters wide x 12,000meters long with a 1.3meter Outside Diameter. Acoater can easily cover a

football field and be severalstories tall.

The Converter:This is the job of Slot-Tick-ets. They receive rolls ofpaper from the coater thathave been slit and rewoundto fit their presses. They arethe “printers” of the grouptaking your order and cus-tomizing it for your prop-erty. They print on theirpresses the property’s mul-ticolored logo on the non-thermal side along with theTOF (top of form) registra-tion marks required for thethermal printers. Often,they include a counterfeitdeterrent known as “WhitePhantom". We could tell youmore about this but we’dhave to kill you.

The thermal side is mostlyleft blank for the thermalimages of the bar code andspecific ticket information.The resulting convertedprinted packs of tickets areavailable in a wide numberof per pack requirements,

as well as Jumbo Packs of1,000 always banded forprotection and packed in asolid box to keep them safeand clean. A cartridge forspecial applications con-tains 1,200 tickets ready todrop into the printer’s pa-per hopper.

Thermal Coating andDirect Thermal Printing:For chemistry buffs, Slot-Tickets uses a leuco dyesystem. Microencapsulatedleuco dye ink is an aque-ous-based ink product thatis nearly colorless as sup-plied but turns to colorwhen the capsules areruptured in the presence ofa suitable activator. It is thesame material used for gaspump receipts and EKGstrip charts. Of course,those papers are not allequal in print and durabil-ity quality but they are allrelated.

Direct thermal paper isessentially a self-containedprinting system; no external


inks or ribbons are needed. The original Coater appliescoatings to a base paper with a chemical formula thatincludes colorless dyes and developers. When the papergoes through a thermal printer, heat (thermal energy)from the thermal print head causes the dye and devel-oper to activate and form a high definition image. Thethermal print head consists of a multitude of pixels(miniature resistive heating elements) distributed alongits printing width. Each pixel is electronically controlledto deliver the correct amount of energy to an exactlocation for an exact amount of time. Those individualpoints of energy together form the final image - text,graphics, and bar codes. Direct thermal paper is envi-ronmentally safe and fully recyclable.

The approved papers used for slot ticket productionhave a long and durable image life and resistance tomany environmental hazards such as water, oil andexcessive light. However, they still must be stored ac-cording to the warnings printed on the side of the ship-ping box.

Slot-Tickets is a wholly owned member of the WS Pack-aging Group, Inc. and are based in Memphis, Tennes-see. For further information, contact:[email protected]" or visit the website atwww.slot-tickets.com.

Introducing:at ICE 2008London, England

Slot TechInternational

MagazineUp-to-date technicalinformation about slotmachines, geared spe-cifically for the worldslot machine operator.

If you are interested in reaching the gaming in-dustry outside the USA and Canada, please con-tact our European Editor David Corfield [email protected]

All technical contributions welcome in any language.


Slot Tech Educational Update

Introduction to Slot TechnologyCourse Offered at CSN

Written by: Joe Miller Instructorof “Introduction to Slot Technol-ogy” course at College of South-ern Nevada (CSN)

First, I must thank thepublisher of this maga-zine for including this

article on CSN programs andthe “Introduction to SlotTechnology” course in hismagazine. This is the secondsuch article he has publishedon our program; the firstarticle was by Ray Holdrenabout the new CSN class onCRT/LCD theory, trouble-shooting, and repairs.

The course is an introductorycourse for those interested inslot machines. The interestcan be derived from a desire tobecome a slot technician, floorattendant, students pursuinga slot technology degree/certificate from the college,and always from those thatwant to beat the machines.

The Class is held in theschool’s Slot Lab, which has

an assortment of testers, testequipment, and slot machines(including WMS Bluebird andBally’s M9000). When wecover subjects like “Bill Vali-dators” the students have anassortment of validators tolook at, handle, and performsome maintenance tasks.Some of the other Hands•]Onclasses involved touchscreens, disassembly/assem-bly of push buttons, identifi-cation of defective switchesusing on•]board diagnostics,removing and reinstalling reelstrips and assemblies, andmany other maintenance/troubleshooting tasks.

Since the course is introduc-tory there are no prerequisitesexcept a desire to learn. Aftertaking the course studentsshould have and understand-ing of:• The history of gaming ma-chines• Types of gaming machinessuch as Slant tops, Uprights,Round tops, and Bar tops

• Location of each majorsubassembly • The majormanufacturers of gamingdevices• The theory of operation andmodes of operation of elec-tronic slot machines• The use of microprocessorsin gaming machines• The use of Peripherals suchas bill validator, coin accep-tors, hoppers, CRTs, reels,LCDs, and stepper motors• Reel strips, virtual reels,pseudo random number gen-erators, pay tables, and PARsheets• Hard and Soft meters •Machine Theme Conversions •Program Summary Reports(PSR)• Key maintenance tasksdealing with Bill and coinjams, Player disputes concern-ing Coin in, Coin out, billvalidator, game and Statisticalrecall, troubleshooting, etc

For a floor attendant or anapprentice slot technician thiscourse provides introductoryinformation on how the gam-ing machines work, howeverindividual casino rules, poli-cies and procedures are be-yond the scope of the course.These same subjects arecovered in much more depthin the School’s two slot prin-ciples classes which require asound grounding in analogand digital electronics.

This course is offered everysemester at CSN. There aretwo sections offered during thecoming Spring Semester (22January – 17 May 2007); one


Expand Your Knowledge & Sharpen Your Skills

College of Southern Nevada offers a two-year Associate of Applied Science degree and one-year Certificate of Achievement.

Courses offered this spring:

• Slot Principles II

• CRT/LCD Troubleshooting

• Intro to Slot Technology

• General Electronics

• Digital Logic I

For further information, call

702 – 651 - 4127 702 – 651 - 2614

OTHERS SHOW YOU HOW, WE TEACH YOU WHY

on Saturday morning and anonline version. If you live inLas Vegas and can attend theSaturday class is recom-mended. Registration ends 18January, however late regis-tration ends on 25 January.• Saturday 9:00AM – 11:50AM, Cheyenne Campus Room2739, Course Name: ET 138BSection 001, Call # 25632• On-Line Class (aka DistanceEducation – DE), CourseName: ET 138B SectionDED01, Call # 56760

In addition to the Introductionto Slot Technology courses, wewill be offering General Elec-tronics I and Digital Logic I.General Electronics I is thebasic concepts of passivecircuits. Components and testequipment are used in practi-cal experiments during theclass. General Electronics Irequires a math prerequisite.Digital Logic I is a coursewhich covers numberingsystems, logic gates, Booleanalgebra, K•]maps, combina-tional circuits, andFlip•]flops. Like GeneralElectronics I, students will beperforming practical experi-ments to understand thefunction and operation ofdigital circuits.

Signing up to become a stu-dent is easy. Normally, youwould apply/register whichcan be done online. Then youcan attend a student orienta-

tion, either live or online. If you areconsidering a degree program, youwould complete financial aid forms, visita counselor and take placement tests.Finally, you would register for the classand pay tuition and any fees.

For more information on our two•]yearAssociate of Applied Science degree withSlot Repair Emphasis or one•]yearCertification of Achievement programs,contact our department office at702•]651•]4127, Joe Miller [email protected], or the programdirector, Jim Jennings [email protected] .


Slot Tech Show Report - SlotFest 2007

King of the cold cathodes, CI Inno-vations’ Harry Iverson gave a briefpresentation about replacementlamps for LCD monitors. Dang!Those things are bright! He alsobought lunch for the class onWednesday! Thank, Harry.

“Wait! I gotta put on my jacket!” RayHoldren’s presentation on usingSencore test equipment to repairLCD monitors was fast-paced andhighly informative. Don’t let thejacket fool you. The day before hewas spotted wearing his motor-cycle colors.

David Oldham of AESI pre-sented a technical look at theMEI bill acceptor and theFutureLogic ticket printer.

Alice Begay, Christina A. Cadue, Steven Wesley-Apache Gold Casino, Ric Cooper, Cordis Gilliam-Aqua Caliente Casino, Angela Rivera, JesseReeves-Bear River Casino, Steven Whitehead-Bluewater Resort & Casino, Charlie Wilson, James Alexander, Darren Frenzen-Cache Creek CasinoResort,Ben Benigas-Cannery Casino, Al Kapacinkas, Paul Martinez-Casino at the Downs, Dan Doctor, Tim Foster-Casino Rama, Marco Fuentes,Mike Glaser, Pryor Nabis-Casino Regina, Billy Spradlin-Cherokee Nation Enterprises, Matt Brittain-Chewelah Casino, Boe Woonsook, Ron Hendricks-Fort Hall Casino, Jayson Strong, Rick Anderson, Casey Valley, Joe Zaitz-Fortune Bay Resort Casino, Donald Tolhert, Rickey Alexander-FortuneValley Hotel & Casino, Larry Hodgson, Len Smikun-Incredible Technologies, Karin Stewart, Maria Bookout, Norma Murillo-Inn of the MountainGods, Mike Green-KLA-MO-YA Casino, Bernard Dust Jr., Brian Big Man, Howard Hogan, John E. Wilson IV-Little Big Horn Casino, Lorrain Horn,Susan Buckingham, Sharon Gallentine, Tamara Carey-Little River Casino Resort, Michael Richardson, Sharon Thomas-Mazatzal Casino, MichelleDedmon-Motor City Casino, Belinda Armitage-Northern Quest Casino, Henry George Jr., Raylene Fawn Swan-Okanogan Bingo-Casino,MarlonOlliuierre-Seaport Casino Aruba, Jaime Barriga, Victor Fortenbach-Spa Resort Casino, Robert Sult-Treasure Island, Christopher Hardwick-TwoRivers Casino, Bentley Watts, Gabriel Leight, Nathaniel Buck-Ute Mountain Casino, Brian Zelner- PINNACLE ENTERTAINMENT, INC.

SlotFestTechFest 16 UNR Teams With

Slot Tech Magazine


This Year I made it to TechFest. All I cansay is WOW.

I would like to thank Randy Fromm for makingthis unbelievable training event available toSlot Technicians, bringing the best of the best,knowledgeable instructors together to oneplace. In short, this event was incredible (trulyexcellent). This was one of the best lifelonglearning courses I’ve taken. If you have notbeen to a TechFest you should plan to attendthe next one. If you have been, go again. Formyself a lot of it was review, but I did learn alot.

Thank you to all of the instructors. Randy, isfunny, energetic and has an enthusiastic wayof teaching that consistently kept the classalive. I had just sat down and it felt like justminutes later we were taking a break. Wheredid the time go? He made the class veryenjoyable and much easier to absorb theinformation. His enthusiasm is phenomenal.

Ray Holdren loves teaching. It is immediatelyevident from the enthusiastic way he talksabout his profession, he is very knowledgeable.

David Oldham, Paul Hatin & Mark Roberts,Troy Nofziger, Russ Wige and Jack Geller wereall excellent instructors, had great tips andadvice and were all very knowledgeable.Lectures were clear, loaded with informationand enthusiastically presented.

- Robert SultTreasure Island Casino, Las Vegas


At TechFest 16, Ceronix’s Troy Nofziger(above) took usthrough a detailed look at troubleshooting their legacy CRTmonitors as well as their newest LCD monitors. He pre-sented some important information about LCD design thatwe have reprinted in the following pages. The entirePowerpoint presentation is available online as well. Justvisit the Slot Technical Department at slot-tech.com

Mark Roberts (l) and Paul Hatin from 3M Touch Sys-tems introduced us to a couple of new items at Tech-Fest 16. One was new software to replace their DOS-Based “Microcal” program, another was a brand newway to attach touchscreens to monitors without usingthat adhesive foam tape that is so difficult to removewhen the sensor needs to be replaced. Based on theCommand adhesive, touchscreen removal now takesonly seconds and requires no tools.

The University of Nevada, Reno conducted a parallel training session at the same time as TechFest 16.The SlotFest gaming management seminar faculty consisted of Ken Moberly (l) and David Chavez. I satin on some of their presentations. Awesome stuff. They have been invited for a repeat performance atthe next “Fest” in May at Mystic Lake Casino in Minneapolis, Minnesota.


LCD BLOCK DIAGRAM

POWER SUPPLY

CPM2199A 12V

CPM2201 24V

A TO D

CONTROLLER

CPM2281 12V 17” & 19”

CPM2281A 12V OR 24V

& IR

BACKLIGHT

INVERTER

CPM2282 12V

CPM2237 12V

CPM2253A 24V

CPM2243 12V ATRONIC

LCD PANEL

BACKLIGHT LAMPSLVDS RECEIVER

CPP1700 17" TFT LCD PANEL SAMSUNG #LTM170E8-L01

CPP1701 19"TFT LCD PANEL SAMSUNG LTM190E4-LO2

CPP1705 15" TFT LCD PANEL SPVA SAMSUNG LTB150X1-L01


Ceronix LCD MonitorPower SupplyReplacement

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On-Site Slot Tech TrainingCustomized Classes Available

CRT and LCD

Subscriptions & Back IssuesWhy back issues of Slot Tech Magazine areimportant to own . . .

Slot Tech Magazine is strictly technical. As such, themagazine's contents are not time critical. The repair information and

technical data contained in past issues is just as valid today as it was the dayit was published.

Additionally, current and future articles more-or-less assume that readers arealready familiar with what has been covered in past issues. This editorial policyassures that Slot Tech Magazine's contributing writers are not limited to"writing down" to the level of a novice technician but are free to continue toproduce the most comprehensive technical articles in the gaming industry.

Randy Fromm'sSlot Tech Magazine ispublished monthly by:Slot Tech Magazine1944 Falmouth Dr.El Cajon, CA 92020-2827tel.619.593.6131fax.619.593.6132e-mail [email protected]

Subscription rates:

Domestic (USA & Canada) 1 year - $60.00 2 years - $120.00

International 1 year - $120.00 2 years - $240.00

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Type of card: [ ] American Express [ ] Discover [ ] MasterCard [ ] VisaAccount Number: ________________________Expiration Date: ________________________

All single issues of Slot Tech Magazine are $10.00/ea.For further details on the contents of each issue,please refer to the website at slot-tech.com

Back Issues

2008 single issues @ $10.00 each! 1 ! 2 ! 3 ! 4 ! 5 ! 6!!!!! 7 !!!!! 8 !!!!! 9 ! 10 ! 11 ! 12

Invoice me!PO Number________________________

Complete archive (2001 to present) avail-able online. Visit slot-techs.com for details.

Contact us for moreinformation aboutLCD repair training

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